


rescue team, party of one

by tendermoonrisssonata



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Albus Dumbledore Bashing, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Cigarettes, Established Sirius Black/Remus Lupin, Hurt Sirius Black, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, James Potter Bashing, M/M, Torture, james potter is privileged cishet white man and remus and sirius are gay trans poc.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:41:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28336344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tendermoonrisssonata/pseuds/tendermoonrisssonata
Summary: sirius is captured, and remus is going to make it everyone’s problem.
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Kudos: 28





	rescue team, party of one

**Author's Note:**

> please heed the tags for content warning!

sirius, in the haze of this beating, wonders if his mother came back from the dead to whip him one last time. but then the whipping stops, and he hears a cold voice say something along the lines of “sit him down.” 

sirius lifts up his head to see voldemort, and voldemort has the audacity to smile. 

“hi there padsy. i hear you’re supposed to be the potter’s secret keeper. tell me, do you think i can beat the secret location out of you?” 

sirius is tired, but he looks up defiantly and coldly says “go to hell.”

voldemort laughs. “aww padfoot. we’re already there, but in this situation, you’re the damned and i am god. what’s potter’s location, padfoot.” 

sirius says, with more power this time, “go to hell.” and spits blood into voldemort’s face. 

“padfoot, dearest. don’t you know by now there isn’t any information you can keep from the dark lord himself.” voldemort leans closely into sirius’s ear. “honestly, i know you’re not the secret keeper. i’m just teasing you. but don’t you want to know how much i know? how i know to call you by your silly childhood nicknames? how i know about your werewolf boyfriend moony’s... drug problems?”

sirius is quiet now. he realizes the implications, and it makes him want to vomit. “yes, my padsy, you put your faith in the wrong hands, but wormtail doesn’t seem to mind. knew i was coming to torture answers out of you and were afraid you wouldn’t be able to take it, huh? poor padfoot. always tortured. bet that spineless fool reg would hate to see you like this. do you want me to call him? i can you know.”

voldemort traces the scars along sirius’s thigh. 

“not so rebellious now, are we? i’ll be honest. i don’t want to keep my prey disappointed if they were preparing themselves to be hunted by me. that’s why you’re here even though you told that rat spy all the answers i needed to hear. do you feel honored?”

voldemort traces cigarette burns from nights sitting by the windowsill in his dorm while remus breathed evenly in their bed, hasty slashes from glass long forgotten, a myriad of wounds from his mother’s abuse. 

sirius trembles. whimpers even. trembles with fear of what voldemort might do. trembles with want of remus, just to see remus again. voldemort’s feather light touch almost is tender. he laughs, “do you think i haven’t been intimate, sirius black? i can show you, if you’d like.” and sirius thinks he sees the light before being struck by the cruciatus curse. 

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

“where’s sirius?” remus asks when james apparated into his flat. he could have guessed from the expression on james’s face that it wasn’t news he wanted to hear. 

“lily and harry are on the run to a new location. sirius is missing. i came here to tell you,” james said quietly. 

“missing?”

“yes.”

“what the bloody hell does that mean, james?” remus’s voice raised. 

“marlene and dorcas says he’s been captured. cause voldemort think he’s secret keeper.”

remus freezes. because there’s no way sirius was captured. sirius was a wild card. no one could make that man do anything he didnt want to do. his mind races. “think? what do you mean think?”

“we, uh, we switched secret keeper last minute. sirius and peter. it was padfoot’s idea to do it. but its been compromised, the location. dumbledore thinks wormtail’s the spy” 

“when’s the rescue team leaving?”

“m-“

“when’s the rescue team leaving, james?”

“moony, we-“

“don’t call me that. when’s the rescue team leaving?”

james is taken aback, not knowing how to react to remus’s coldness. “we can’t rescue him. d- dumbledore says padfoot’s as good as.. as dead.” 

remus is silent, gripping the chair in front of him. maybe in another life, sirius and him live a long old life where they never suffered, only smiled, because love triumphed all. maybe he’s regarded as a wise, stern father figure for the next generation. maybe sirius lets remus fuck him into the next decade and they leave everything else at the door. 

“look.. remus,” james says anxiously, as if his mouth didn’t know how to form the words “i get what you’re feeling. i loved him as much as you do. it’s just that dumbledore-“

“fuck you potter. you don’t know an inch of what i’m feeling,” remus says. he’s gotten in the habit of cutting james off in the course of this conversation. “sirius isn’t dead and you’re treating him like hes long lost roadkill.”

remus turns, looking james directly in the eye, “i love him. and you will never understand what that means.” james nods, head hung in shame. “you don’t know an inch of what i’m feeling. you’ve been spoonfed since birth. your parents love you and provide for you. you wouldn’t have to get a job if you really wanted to because of your family’s wealth. you have a wife and child and have never looked sideways while changing in the locker room. you were always taught to do the right thing and still, somehow through all of that nourishing parental privilege, you were a bully for most of your time at hogwarts. sirius and i are two brown fags. sirius has been beaten into delirium by his parents until all he can do is whisper my name as if that would summon me. hes been sold to be fucked by his fathers business partners. and after all of that still understands about loyalty and courage born out of love. you, james potter, dont know shit about our relationship or pain, as a matter of fact, so i’d kindly ask you to get your white ass out of our flat and to wherever voldemort’s hideout is.” 

james shakes his head. “i can’t. i’m sorry remus, but i can’t”

remus laughs. “so that’s it? harry’s godfather is captured and your family is being taken to the next safe house. have a back up plan for if you and lily die? it’s clear you won’t trust me to be his godfather. maybe we can call wormtail and let him take care of harry, yeah?” 

“marlene and dorcas found something. in front of the entrance to the dungeons. it uh. it was a vial with memories. of sirius. being tortured by walburga and orion before he came to live with me permanently.”

“let me see it.”

“moony i dont think thats wise”

“potter let me see it or so help me god” 

“i’m sorry remus,” james says with finality and then leaves with a pop. 

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

weeks later, remus is a shell. kept at arm’s length from dumbledore and james and alastor. voldemort was dead, but death eaters were still a threat to society and missions were still being assigned. remus spent nights begging to merlin that at least soon sirius’s body would be found somehow, and then the autopsy reports would say he died with minimal lasting pain, that the killing was a mercy before sirius was so blinded and bloodied that all he could do was beg for voldemort to stop. he’s been doing routine order missions for dumbledore, a way of dumbledore to shut remus up from demanding they go search for sirius or let him see the memories in dumbledore’s pensive. james had won that argument. when remus wasn’t on missions, he was drunk. 

it was a tuesday night. remus laid in his and sirius’s bed hoping to get some sleep before his mission with alastor and molly tomorrow. an easy routine check to see if there were any death eaters at the old hideout. his partners on the mission, though, gave him grief. alastor was there for babysitting, obviously, to make sure remus didn’t get out of hand. molly was there because the mission was easy and didn’t have too many risks. remus imagines molly at home, impoverished just like him and sirius, raising so many children with an outspoken husband who couldn’t bring in enough money to feed them all. remus swears he would protect molly, doesn’t know what the weasly family would do if she were gone, and then remus imagines sirius laughing at him while they hold hands and pass a joint between themselves. molly can protect herself y’know, moonshine. remus frowns, upset that sirius’s ghost lives in his head. 

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

remus tries to walk discreetly on crunchy leaves and hidden twigs. alastor glares at him while he and molly apparate to the front of the abandoned death eater hideout. a mansion abandoned, with unswept appearances and untrimmed bushes. 

in the mansion, alastor splits from the group to check the top floor, telling molly and remus to check the first floor. their footsteps echo as if a child is following them, and molly instinctively grabs remus’s hand in fear and he doesn’t want to let go. 

“lumos.”

the kitchen they walked in is empty and pristine. a door to the right of the stove sits closed, and remus knows it probably is just the pantry. but remus turns off the light from his wand, and, still holding molly’s hand, carefully and quietly opens the door. he sees the outline of basement stairs. molly whispers, “moony, dear, maybe we should wait for alastor.” 

“you can stay up here if you’d like.” remus walks down the stairs, letting go of molly’s hand with a squeeze. 

in the basement there is barely any light. the only indication that it is day comes from a small grate that remus recognized from the entrance. he sees a figure, in the dark, and from the figure, hears tired wheezes. remus’s gut twists, and he quickly lights up the basement. remus sees sirius, or at least, he think he does. a poor man, bloody, hunched over tied to a chair in the middle of a dungeon. remus runs to him, gently moving the man’s hair out of his face and sees sirius covered in blood. 

“p- padfoot. it’s me. it’s remus. it’s moony. i’m here. i’m here sirius. please wake up. please be okay. p-padfoot i love you. padfoot. padfoot. padfoot.” remus is pleading, holding sirius’s face in his hands. because he remembers that sirius has never been able to resist remus when he begged, despite all sensibilities. remus thinks of when regulus pulled remus to talk in an empty corridor in his fifth year, to scold him for letting sirius sell his.. services and stolen priceless junk from grimmaulds place to be able to afford the high end pain medication and drugs that remus kept begging for during his withdrawals. remus hadnt known, he figured sirius just stole the drugs from a muggle pharmacy. 

alastor and molly walk down the stairs to the dungeon soon after. molly screams in horror at the puddle of blood around sirius, the guts on the floor, and the near dead lover in the chair. she goes to hold remus, who has just been whispering “please padfoot. sirius please. wake up baby. padfoot?” 

“i called for medical help,” alastor says when he returns. “stay put, they’ll be here in a few” and then alastor goes back upstairs.

remus cries as molly begins to cut through the rope binding sirius. sirius’s inner right arm is burned. sirius had gotten his first tattoo there, a calendar of the moon phases. ‘i think i could live my life as your shadow,‘ sirius had said before getting the tattoo. when remus laughed at sirius’s choice of words sirius had kissed remus’s cheek and said ‘really dear, you’re all i’ve ever wanted. you’re all i’ll ever need. you’re the best of us. i love you.’ remus felt numb. thinking that if sirius came out of this alive, he’d get tattoos dedicated to sirius on every part of his body and sirius would never go a day without hearing a litany of devotionals remus wrote about him. molly finished cutting through the rope, and they worked together to lay sirius gently on the floor, away from the pile of his organs and pool of his blood. remus is holding sirius so gently, and he doesn’t know how sirius could still be breathing after what he went through. as molly murmurs healing spells around sirius’s injuries, remus doesn’t know how he could still be breathing after seeing his lover nearly dead. 

the healers came very quickly after alastor called them. remus, at some point, was told to leave, that they’d call him from saint mungo’s in a day or two, that he would not be barred entry because he was gay and sirius and him werent legally domestic partners, or because he was an angry brown man, or because he was a werewolf, that it was imperative sirius be given some space right now. molly thanks the healers on remus’s behalf and takes him back to her house to sit by the fireplace away from his shared flat with sirius and away from any bottle of whiskey he might have wanted to nurse. remus tries to close his eyes and imagine a world where sirius is naked on their bed with a faded line across his stomach, healed from when voldemort wanted to see what a living person would look like with their intestines splayed out on the floor, begging to see his lover once more.


End file.
